"Bill O'Reilly deserves the credit for creating the modern American conception of the War on Christmas. While O'Reilly is no longer a major player, the right has persisted in its odd insistence that Christmas is under attack. That this war has been debunked repeatedly does not matter. While I will discuss some aspects of this war, my interest is with the general methods used to craft and propagate a fictional narrative of a war on X (whatever X might be). I will call this WOX."
"If you want to start a WOX, you begin by selecting the X for your new war. You will want to select something your target audience values and it will ideally be something they already fear might be threatened by people they fear and dislike. But you can generate fear on your own if you need to. Given the patent absurdity of claiming there is a war on Christmas, you could start a culture war around almost anything."
Bill O'Reilly created the modern American conception of the War on Christmas. The political right persists in asserting that Christmas is under attack despite repeated debunking. WOX names the template for crafting and propagating fictionalized 'wars on' valued targets. Starting a WOX involves selecting an X that the target audience values and fears losing to disliked groups, or manufacturing that fear. The 'war on' framing can be verbal or simply claim 'X is under attack.' WOX relies on fabricating examples and using Argument by Example to present isolated or invented incidents as proof of a broader assault.
Read at A Philosopher's Blog
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